The Trade Sustainability Impact Assessment of the EU-Korea FTA negotiations will identify the impacts on sustainable development of the Agreement to be negotiated; make policy recommendations; and contribute to informed discussion.

About the Trade Sustainability Impact Assessment

The negotiation of a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between the European Union and the Republic of Korea was launched on 6 May 2007 in Seoul and the negotiations are ongoing. The European Commission has supported a series of studies to Assess the Sustainability Impacts of prospective trade negotiations. The collaborative project the EU-Korea FTA Trade Sustainability Impact Assessment (SIA) is intended to produce studies in order to provide a deeper understanding of the sustainability impacts of the trade and investment aspects of the Free Trade Agreement and of the mechanisms through which they might affect both the EU and Korea. The studies will consider any relevant economic, environmental and social impacts resulting from the FTA. The studies will make policy proposals (both trade and non-trade related) for optimising the outcome of the negotiations, preventing and/or mitigating possible negative impacts and enhancing positive ones including through the identification of flanking measures in the EU 27 and Korea. The SIA will seek input from stakeholder groups and will provide input to discussions between EU and Korea representatives and stakeholders about the sustainability implications of the FTA under negotiation.

The project is implemented by the Consortium of IBM Business Consulting (Belgium) in association with DMI, TAC and Ticon on the European side in collaboration with the FTA Research Centre, Inha Univerity on the Korean side.

All of the studies that are produced for the EU-Korea FTA Sustainability Impact Assessment will be circulated in draft for comment and review. Comments on the draft reports are encouraged. Please send emails to mail@eu-korea-sia.org